


index

by InsertLogin



Series: they're teaching me to kill (who's teaching me to love?) [4]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-28
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 16:21:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29031591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InsertLogin/pseuds/InsertLogin
Summary: a list of ocs that appear in every work of "they're teaching me to kill (who's teaching me to love?)" because there are a Lot + real life influencesprev titled "just a list of ocs"
Series: they're teaching me to kill (who's teaching me to love?) [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1862509
Kudos: 5





	1. cast

**Author's Note:**

> I'm the author and even I can't keep track of all my OCs (and I wanted a more put together place to put the cultural influences) so this is just a list of all that. Will be updated as the series goes on to include new characters and new facts, since some things are slight spoilers. 
> 
> Ch 1 will be a list of ocs, and the chapters after that will be for individual works. 
> 
> If you think that I've missed someone, or you'd like some more information to be added, just lmk.

Lin, Chen, and Meiling: the three who are responsible for delivering Zuko to the front on the orders of Fire Lord Azulon. he/him; he/him; she/her respectively. Present in: _if i’m old enough to die for your mistakes (then let's go)_. 

Captain Lao: the captain of the company that Zuko was first brought to, and was supposed to carrying letters for. He was supposed to report Zuko’s death, and though Zuko didn’t die, Lao still stated that he did. He has an unnamed nephew that's younger than Zuko. Present in: _if i’m old enough to die for your mistakes (then let's go)_.

Li of Hira’a and Li of Jang Hui: two soldiers in Captain Lao’s company. both he/him. Present in: _if i’m old enough to die for your mistakes (then let's go)_.

Hafeeza: Earth Kingdom resident in the Lower Ring of Ba Sing Se. She saved Lu Ten (who goes by the alias of Sasrutha). Attends Ba Sing Se University through the help of her friend, Yuvan. Present in: _covered in all my friends (i still think of the bombs they build)  
_

Noor: Hafeeza’s younger sister. _Present in: covered in all my friends (i still think of the bombs they build)_

Yuvan: Earth Kingdom resident in the Middle Ring of Ba Sing Se. Provided a place for Lu Ten to live as Hafeeza didn’t have the space or resources to take care of him. Present in: _covered in all my friends (i still think of the bombs they build)_

Asha: Yuvan’s mother, extreme lover of pai sho. Present in: _covered in all my friends (i still think of the bombs they build)_

Achala: Lu Ten’s mother. Had a younger brother, Sasrutha, from where Lu Ten gets his alias. Lu Ten remarked that she's gone, but she's not dead. Mentioned in: _covered in all my friends (i still think of the bombs they build)_

Parvaneh: a teacher aide in Hafeeza's class. She's the one who amputates Lu Ten's legs. Mentioned in: _covered in all my friends (i still think of the bombs they build)_

Smiles: a Dai Li agent that Lu Ten regularly plays pai sho with. "Smiles" is what Lu Ten calls them in his brain. they/them pronouns since Lu Ten doesn't know their gender. Present in: _covered in all my friends (i still think of the bombs they build)_

Green: Smiles’s partner. "Green" is what Lu Ten calls them in his brain. they/them pronouns since Lu Ten doesn't know their gender. Present in: _covered in all my friends (i still think of the bombs they build)_

Kuzon of Shu Jing: a soldier in the 41st Division. He died. Present in: _we lit the fire (and it's burning bright)_

Akio: one of the medics that takes care of Zuko. he had two younger cousins who idolized him and were in the 41st Division (and were killed). Present in: _we lit the fire (and it's burning bright)_

Mio: another medic that takes care of Zuko. she/her. Present in: _we lit the fire (and it's burning bright)_

Asa: a Head Courier. In charge of the dorm that Zuko lives in. they/them. Present in: _we lit the fire (and it's burning bright)_

Kuzon of Kaijin: a courier in Zuko’s dorm and part of the Courier Li fan club. he/him. Present in: _we lit the fire (and it's burning bright)_

Akari of Kaijin: Kuzon's older sister who's in the military. She doesn't appear in person, but she is referenced. Referenced in: _we lit the fire (and it's burning bright)_

Kukrit: a courier in Zuko’s dorm and unofficial president of the Courier Li fan club. he/him. Present in: _we lit the fire (and it's burning bright)_

Chiyo: a courier in Zuko’s dorm and part of the Courier Li fan club. she/her. Present in: _we lit the fire (and it's burning bright)_

Amastan: airbender from a Si Wong tribe. he/him. Present in: _we lit the fire (and it's burning bright)_

Abenanka: Mio's girlfriend. Present in: _we lit the fire (and it's burning bright)_


	2. if i'm old enough to die for your mistakes (then let's go)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> real world influences (including meaning behind names) for "if i'm old enough to die for your mistakes (then let's go)" (work one of this series)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you end up being like "hey why do you use 'from what I've seen' and 'from what I gather'? so much, the answer is that I haven't watched the show and I'm not a part of many of the groups that this will relate to.

Not so much as direct cultural influences, but a couple notes about the ATLA world as they’ll be in this series.

Here, the Fire Nation will have more influences from Japan than China. From what I gather, the Fire Nation was supposed to be more based on Japan, but at the last minute, they changed to the inspiration being China. You can see both of these, because the Fire Nations being islands that end up being united under one Fire Lord is reminiscent of Japan’s history. Also, considering the Earth Kingdom has quite a few cultural influences from China, that could also be a callback to when Japan occupied China. There are a lot of Chinese cultural elements in the Fire Nation (and elements from various South East Asian (SEA) countries, I’ve noticed. @atlaculture on tumblr marks down a lot of these) and also, the genocide of the Air Nomads by the Fire Nation is, I’m pretty sure, a direct reference to the genocide of the Tibetan people by China (especially since the Air Nomads, also from what I’ve gathered, are a stereotype of Tibetan Buddhists). 

The way that I’ll have it is that the main isles are more noticeably centered around Japanese influenced culture (even though there are other cultures that are hidden or not as open), and the colonies have more influences from other East Asian cultures. That will be more elaborated on as the series goes on, because the bonus point of having a shitton of OCs is that you get to assign them different cultural backgrounds and have them navigate the world in relation to that. 

I haven't watched the show so maybe this is in fact how things work there, but here, some Air Nomads were raised in the temples to become monks etc. like Aang was, but others were are, as "Air Nomads" suggests, nomads.

There are also going to be more SEA inspired characters, as well as Middle Eastern/(North) African characters. 

_Meaning of names_ (take all of these with grains of salt because while I think they’re close enough to the meaning & I try to corroborate the names with other sources, it’s really very possible that I’ve made a mistake):

Meiling: Chinese first name that means “beautiful” and or “delicate” 

Chen: common surname that has variations essentially all across East Asia. Names like Cheng and Shen have also in the past been romanized as Chen. “Chen” is a common romanization from Mandarin, though. Name refers to being from the Chen region (which is now the Henan Province in China) and also “dawn”, “morning” or “great/grace”. 

Lin: Chinese surname (though this is the Mandarin romanization). Fun fact that I might use in the future: the characters used to denote Lin (林) also denotes a surname in Japan, though that surname is Hayashi. It means “forest.”


	3. covered in all my friends (i still think of the bombs they build)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> real world influences (including meaning behind names) for "covered in all my friends (i still think of the bombs they build)" (work two of this series)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh yeah, just in general, if you think I've missed something, then just lmk.

So because I saw [ this ](https://avatarnews.co/post/189781695345/general-iroh-and-his-son-prince-lu-ten#_=_) picture of Lu Ten, my mind ran away with biracial Lu Ten and literally that picture is my one (1) basis for this. 

_Names and their meanings:_

Disclaimer/note: due to the spread of Islam (mainly through the Arab/Muslim conquests, I believe they're called), Islam and Arabic still have sizable influences on non-Arab areas and populations. I'm not going to be having a version of the Arab/Muslim conquests because Reasons, but the effects of those conquests (and of later instances of the spread of Islam) will show up. As I don't like making up names, I take them from their respective regions, which have obviously gone through the conquests, so a name of Arabic origin does not necessarily mean that the character would be Arab coded. Additionally, some languages in the region (look specifically at Urdu and Farsi) have a lot of similarities.

Also since different religions will show up in the fic (most likely; I'm still ironing out the details), I'd like to take the moment to say that criminalizing apostasy is not an _inherent_ part of any of the religions in this series. For those that don't know, apostasy is essentially "turning your back" on a religion, either by being irreligious or converting to another religion. There are a number of places in the world that criminalize it, in some cases by death, and all the main religions that I know of have some form of it. Hinduism is more tolerant to it and Buddhism officially doesn't acknowledge it, so people are free to renounce Buddhism without consequences. Of course, things can vary in individual circles.

Noor: name of Arabic origin. Means “light.” She would be Pashtun (a majority ethnic group in areas like Pakistan, Afghanistan, India, and more) coded.

Hafeeza: Urdu name that is of Arabic origin. Means “protector.” She’d also be Pashtun coded. 

Sasrutha: Lu Ten’s alias; it seems to be a Sinhalese name that means “truth.” 

Yuvan Das: Yuvan is derived from Sanskrit, meaning “young/youth”. Also seems to refer to strong/adult. Das is a surname that means “servant” and is commonly among Hindu/Sikhs. Specifically, Yuvan would be Bengali coded.

Achala: name refers to a deity prominent in Vajrayana Buddhism (but is also more commonly spelled as Acala). That fact is unrelated to why I chose the name. It apparently means "the immovable" in Sanskrit. (Sinhala shows heavy Sanskrit influence) I also realized that I misread when I chose this name. The source I read at first just talked about East Asian and South East Asian Buddhism, and I read those as the same thing, even though they’re not (Vajrayana Buddhism is practiced more commonly among some East Asian countries and Theravada Buddhism among some South East Asian countries). Achala, since she’s coded Sinhalese, would have practiced the equivalent of Theravada Buddhism, not Vajrayana Buddhism. 

Parvaneh: Persian name that means “butterfly.”

Asha: Just learned that it also has Swahili origins, but I was specifically looking at the name derived from Sanskrit, meaning “hope, desire.” The Swahili name seems to be derived from the word/or a name meaning “life.” 


	4. we lit the fire (and it's burning bright)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> real world influences (including meaning behind names) for "we lit the fire (and it's burning bright)" (work three of this series)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> finally we get to a work longer than a chapter. this one will be updated as wltf gets completed.

Forgot to mention this earlier, but a lot of the military info is based on the US. 

_ Culture/Item/Food stuff/Other: _

Sake - alcoholic beverage

Waraji - Japanese footwear that was standard among commoners. From what I read, it was more useful for manual work than other footwear (because it was secured around the ankle rather than solely being like sandals).

Jika-tabi - another form of Japanese footwear. Was and continues to be useful for its grip and flexibility of the soles. 

Kaijin - Japanese word that means ashes, complete destruction, and embers according to the sites I looked at.

Huihuai Stronghold: made this up to be the sister stronghold to Pohuai. Pohuai translates to something close to "to damage/destroy" in Chinese and the site I looked at provided words with similar meanings, one of which was Huihuai.

_ People _ : (I’ll add onto this section later, I just have to do some work now)

Tuareg:   


Ainu: 

_ Meaning of names _ :

Akio: So there are several kanji combinations for this (昭夫, 昭男, 昭雄, more), but the first character (昭) means “bright/luminous” and the second characters are all variations on man/hero/husband/manly/etc. So basically, Akio is a bright man. Would’ve been more accurate if he was a firebender but oh well. I didn’t choose this name for the meaning. 

Mio: Japanese name that means beautiful cherry blossom/thread. (Thank you behindthename.com; 美桜 and 美緒 are two combinations. 美 is for beautiful, 桜 for cherry blossom, 緒 for thread). 

Asa: name of Hebrew origin. Means “doctor, healer” and wow this is another instance in which I should have looked up what the name actually meant because I could have done a cool connection. 

Akari of Kaijin: Once again, different combinations of kanji lead to slightly different meanings. I like this version the best: 朱里 where 朱 means “vermillion red” and 里 means “village.”

Kukrit: Thai name and I actually did store the meaning of the name somewhere but I lost that and a quick search doesn’t pull it back up for me. 

Chiyo: Same disclaimer about kanji combinations. Was looking at this specific combination 千代 where 千 is “thousand” and 代 “generations.” 

Amastan: According to behindthename.com “Means "protector, defender" in Tuareg, derived from the Tamazight root  _ esten _ meaning "to protect, to defend".”

Abenanka: is an Ainu name. No clue what it means, because I was just trying to find a name that is actually Ainu. 

Ao: Zuko’s second alias. Japanese word for the blue-green color spectrum. 


End file.
